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American Morning
Death Toll Rises in Southeast Asia After Major Earthquake; Airline Mistakes Caused Travel Hassles in U.S.
Aired December 27, 2004 - 08:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RICK SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: First it's an earthquake, then a tsunami. And what a tsunami. An unstoppable force of nature has exacted a terrible toll. This is massive water washed back into the Indian Ocean. The world is only beginning to realize, as it wakes up collectively, the number of dead, injured and missing and homeless, as well. Relief is streaming into coastal parts of Indonesia, Indian, Sri Lanka, Thailand. On this AMERICAN MORNING.
ANNOUNCER: From the CNN Broadcast Center in New York, this is AMERICAN MORNING with Bill Hemmer and Soledad O'Brien.
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Well, good morning, everybody. Bill Hemmer and Soledad are out this morning. I'm Heidi Collins.
SANCHEZ: And I'm Rick Sanchez. Good to be here.
COLLINS: Glad you're here.
SANCHEZ: Well, thank you very much.
COLLINS: New information still coming in this morning, talking about the tsunamis that have killed so many people. We are hearing more than 21,000, in fact. By all reports, there was no warning. We're going to find out about tsunami warning systems and the earthquake that caused the giant waves. It is now being marked as 9.0 magnitude.
SANCHEZ: And also here at home, we're going to be checking on the airlines still, trying to straighten out that nightmare that went on all weekend. We're going to be hearing about the perfect storm of problems that left thousands of people stranded and why they shouldn't be completely optimistic about getting where they want to go today. We're going to have all that for you.
COLLINS: And first up, we're going to check the headlines with Carol Costello. Carol, good morning.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to you, good morning to all of you. "Now in the News," a suicide car bomb explodes in Iraq, the blast killing at least six people and wounding 33 others. The explosion taking place near the headquarters for one of the main Shiite political parties in southern Baghdad.
CNN has learned American military commanders are boosting troop levels around the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, the scene of last week's deadly mess hall bombing. That as Iraqis prepare for elections set for the end of next month. U.S. central command chief, General John Abizaid, telling CNN as many as 8,000 troops will be sent to stop anticipated violence in advance of the voting.
Here in the United States, retailers are doing anything they can to lure you into stores this week. They're hoping bargain hunters will make up for disappointing pre-holiday sales. Some chains like Target and J.C. Penny are even running ads trying to get people to use their Christmas gift cards before the New Year's. That's because retailers can't claim count the gift cards as holiday sales until the cards are actually redeemed.
And daredevil French climber Alain Robert has conquered the world's new tallest skyscraper. The self-described spiderman scaling the 111 story in Tawain on Christmas Day. It took the 42-year-old four hours to reach the top, nearly 16,070 feet off the ground. The new skyscraper officially opens on New Year's Eve. And look, Robert has already christened it.
SANCHEZ: But why would you do something so brazen wearing hot pink?
COLLINS: Do you think he wants some attention?
SANCHEZ: Just the wrong color, don't you think?
COSTELLO: Did it look hot pink? I thought it looked more orangy red.
SANCHEZ: Oh, no, pretty...
COLLINS: Bright.
SANCHEZ: Yes, it was hot pink.
COLLINS: All right, Carol, thanks so much. We'll check in with you a little bit later on.
Meanwhile now, relief and rescue the top priorities this morning in six Asian countries following a major earthquake deep beneath the Indian Ocean. The epicenter was to the west of the Indonesian island of Sumatra. It sparked multiple tsunamis, which slammed into several countries throughout southern Asia. Giant waves engulfed coastal areas, flooding towns with floating buildings, cars and debris. More than 21,000 people are dead, thousands more still unaccounted for.
Hundreds of thousands of people are now homeless as entire villages were swept away. The earthquake measured 9.0, as we have said, in magnitude, the largest quake in more than 40 years. The hardest hit areas include Indonesia, India and Sri Lanka. Tourists at island resorts are among the tens of thousands reported dead or missing. Aneesh Raman is joining us now live via video phone from Phuket, Thailand, where close to 900 people have confirmed dead there.
Aneesh, good morning to you. Give us the latest, if you would. ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Heidi, good morning to you as well. That death toll more than doubling today. The reason, officials say, is that as of last night, some four to 600 people were thought to have been swept away by these waves, lost at sea, going into last night. Those bodies now starting to wash ashore.
Here on Phuket Island, the death toll now is about 130. The hardest hit is the coastal town of Pungha (ph), there the death toll over 500. And Heidi, as begin to learn the nationalities of these victims, you mentioned it earlier, but it is likely that a good number, if not a majority of these, will be foreign tourists -- Heidi.
COLLINS: Where are they now, quickly, Aneesh? Are there shelters that have been set up at least at this point?
RAMAN: They have the Thai government really taking a full approach to the rescue and relief effort, especially for the tourists. They have set up massive relief operations both here and in Bangkok. Tourists that have severe injuries are being medivaced to the capital city, where some six hospitals are on standby just for them. They are also offering free lodging there for tourists. Also, some of the foreign countries are beginning to send flights in to pick up the bodies of dead nationals, as well as to transport their citizens home -- Heidi.
COLLINS: All right. Aneesh Raman, joining us live, as we said, via video phone from Phuket, Thailand, where it is 8:00 p.m. there, 12 hours ahead, as people try to figure out what they will do next.
SANCHEZ: Let's talk to a survivor now. We've been talking to different people throughout the hours who've actually gone through this experience. Todd Everts is his name. He and his wife survived the tsunami that hit that part of Thailand. Well, this is what's interesting about Todd. He lived two blocks from ground zero, he survived the SARS situation in Hong Kong and now, he goes through this experience, as well. He's joining us now by phone.
Todd, thanks so much for being with us. I suppose you're feeling quite grateful on this day?
TODD EVERTS, TSUNAMI SURVIVOR: I am. I'm very grateful, Rick. When this event occurred yesterday, we were about 15 minutes from heading to the beach, where we had spent most of the day previously on Christmas Eve and then on Christmas Day. We're just devastated because there was absolutely no warning. We had felt something of a tremor earlier in the day, but had no idea of an earthquake, had no idea that a tsunami was coming. And when it hit, there was absolutely complete devastation.
After the swell went back out and it took with it cars and buses and unfortunately, many tourists that were on the beach, there people running, asking if they had seen someone. And it reminded of the days after 9/11, when people were walking around in a daze, trying to see if anyone could locate one of their loved ones.
SANCHEZ: You were kind enough to send us some pictures that you took with your own camera. And one of the pictures you send us is of a Club Med site. And I find this particularly interesting because I think most people who watch this have probably heard -- have visited or have wanted to visit one of these incredible Club Med resorts. Look at this. Not much left. Describe it to us.
EVERTS: Well, I'm not exactly sure which picture you're looking at. But Club Med is quite a large resort and a major structure that has several stories is still intact. But the areas around the Club Med, because it's I all-inclusive resort, are quite guarded with six too eight feet walls. Those walls were absolutely eliminated, which I think is what you're looking at.
That Club Med acted as a break wall, if you will, for the hotel that I'm at, which is one block away from the sea. If Club Med had not been there, then we would have been a direct hit and probably would have looked similar to the photo that you're looking at.
SANCHEZ: You know, when you go through things like this, your experience here, our experience -- covering the story of 9/11, also, the hurricanes in Florida, being a fellow from that area of myself, I always think that it's not just the day it happens or even day after it happens, but it has this lingering effect. And I imagine people there are still some what shell-shocked by what's going on. Put us, if you could, in their situation, what you're hearing from them today, if anything at all.
EVERTS: Rick, if you can imagine the coffee shop that you frequent on a regular basis or the place you have lunch or dinner -- we were just speechless in visiting the restaurants that we had frequented. On Christmas Day, we'd had an Italian lunch on the seaside. We visited that restaurant and there is there no restaurant. It's just simply a pile of rubble. The roof collapsed. The wood oven stove that was used to cook the pizzas is gone and the shop owners have no insurance, they have no inventory, they have no real asset to look at.
And tourists are leaving Phuket, they're not coming. It will take a tremendous amount of time to rebuild and unfortunately, these locals will have to rely on the government and any sort of charity and any sort of fund-raising that could be done on their behalf.
SANCHEZ: Speaking of that, what do they need? How can we help them?
EVERTS: I don't know, but I do imagine the Red Cross is quite involved in visiting with these restaurants and places. Anything that had one story is just gone. There is no more building. It's just simply everything that was in a restaurant is now on the beach, it's in the water, in the sand. To walk along the beach, you see refrigerators, you chairs, the normal things you would have seen in the shops.
And these people that own these shops literally have nothing. The larger hotels probably will have insurance and they can rebuild, but it's the small business owner that is most affected, and people and tourists looking for their loved ones which were swept out to sea.
SANCHEZ: Todd Everts, good enough to join us, going through a very difficult situation. We certainly appreciate your time on a story that we at CNN will continue to cover for you as it develops throughout the course of the day and weeks, no doubt -- Heidi.
COLLINS: Were any of the thousands of tsunami deaths preventable. Could people in India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Thailand been warned to stay away from the coast.
Well, David Applegate is a senior science adviser for the U.S. Geological Survey. He is joining us now from Washington this morning. David, thanks for being here. So what about it? If there had been an early-warning system in place, would people have been saved?
DAVID APPLEGATE, U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY: Absolutely. In the Pacific Ocean Basin, our NOAA, as well as agencies in many other countries, has worked to set up such a system to provide even minutes to hours of warnings. So simply people can get away from the coast. USGS provides realtime earthquake information, and then there's a system in place where you can take that information and gets folks out of harm's way. No such system exist in the Indian Ocean.
COLLINS: As we look at these horrific pictures of people just plain being swept away from things they're trying hang on to there, why doesn't the Indian subcontinent have such a warning system? Is it simply because they have never had an incident like this before?
APPLEGATE: Well, that's certainly a part of it. It's been probably since the 1930s the last time there was an earthquake that caused a tsunami that moved across the Indian Ocean, and it's been since the 19th century that they had one that even came close to this size. This is an absolutely giant earthquake. And as you can see the devastation that it produced is substantial.
COLLINS: As you say that, it makes me think a little bit about, you know, rolling the dice. It seems like if there's all this water surrounding several different areas, and smaller islands, as we see in this portion of the world, there could be a chance of tsunami. In fact, relate that to the United States. Just because we haven't had one before, is it possible it could happen here, too?
APPLEGATE: Well, absolutely. And the United States has been struck by tsunamis. In 1700, an earthquake of roughly this size ripped the entire length of the offshore known as the Cascadia Subduction Zone (ph) off of Washington State and Oregon. The reason we know about that because of very precise tsunami records that have been kept in Japan, the way it's moved all the way across the Pacific.
In 1960, the great Chilean earthquake, which was the largest earthquake in the last 100 years, this being the fourth largest. That struck Hawaii, the tsunami struck Hawaii about 12 hours later, causing significant deaths in Helo (ph). As well as earthquakes -- offshore earthquakes can occur off of Alaska, most recently the 1964 earthquake. Again, those waves only take a few hours to reach Hawaii.
The waves are very difficult to detect in the open ocean. You wouldn't even feel them if you were on a boat. But NOAA has set up a series of buoys out in the open ocean that can detect these waves and therefore provide some warning.
So could they do that for parts of the Indian Ocean now, and will that be done, do you think? Well, it usually takes an event such as this, hopefully not one of quite this magnitude, before the collective will can be galvanized to establish such systems. Both of the tsunami warnings centers that NOAA set up were the result of earlier devastating tsunamis in, first in Alaska and then in Hawaii. So I think it usually takes such an event. We know that we're vulnerable to many different hazards, and especially these events that don't happen very often, unfortunately it's very hard to focus on them ahead of time.
COLLINS: Well, David Applegate, I know that you have certainly seen a lot of this type of weather. So to hear you say that it was just unbelievable tells us an awful lot. We certainly appreciate your time this morning. Thanks again.
APPLEGATE: Certainly.
(WEATHER REPORT)
Just one week to go in 2004, and President Bush is spending it in Crawford, Texas. What's his biggest priority going into 2005? Well, Kamber and May will duke it out for you.
SANCHEZ: Also, Christmas is over, but the travel nightmare does remain. When will stranded travelers finally get to go home?
COLLINS: And do groceries finally arrived at the International Space Station? What was the most unique request? We'll tell you about it, on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: Welcome back, I'm Rick Sanchez here on AMERICAN MORNING. Bad weather wasn't the only reason that this Christmas weekend was a travel nightmare. A complete shut-down of Comair's flight management system left 1,000 flights canceled and 30,000 passengers grounded. Also, U.S. Airways still struggling to sort out a luggage fiasco. 10,000 bags were lost as baggage handlers called in sick in record numbers.
Michael Boyd, an aviation consultant, is joining us now from Denver to try and explain this to us. And we have really two different scenarios, two different airlines. Let's begin with Comair, what's the problem?
MICHAEL BOYD, AVIATION CONSULTANT: Just a mechanical problems. We had bad weather, we had a situation overloaded a computer. This is a computer glitch. Comair is one of the best-run companies in America. They'll fix that. These things happen. We've got to live with it as long we're flying on airplanes and using machinery to get them into the sky.
SANCHEZ: Is this going to have an effect on Delta?
BOYD: Yes, because, you know, you can't book a seat on Comair. Comair is not an airline. They lease crews and airplanes to Delta and Delta schedules them where they will. So these are Delta passengers, not Comair passengers. And yes, Delta Airlines will be working very hard over the next several days to fix the problem because it's their passengers.
SANCHEZ: You know, it's interesting, in this case, with Comair, I understand that there were employees who simply couldn't get to the airport because of some the problems on the roads, right?
BOYD: Oh, absolutely. And in Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, you know, they wanted to de-ice the airplanes. Unfortunately, they couldn't get any de-icing fluid to the airports, so airplanes sat there. It was a Christmas to remember.
SANCHEZ: Well, you know, that's certainly understandable. But now let's switch over to U.S. Air and that's a completely different scenarios. Here we have employees who didn't get to the airport, not because they couldn't, but because it appears they didn't want to, right?
BOYD: Yes, and that's a very tough problem. And there's a major management labor problem at U.S. Airways. I mean, the problem is, these employees have taken 40 percent pay cuts. The company needs, wants additional pay cuts. I can understand why they are demoralized. But the problem is when you start taking that out on that customer, you may as well put keep out sign on your airline and get in the unemployment line, because it doesn't work.
SANCHEZ: So you'd say things, given this scenario, bodes worse for U.S. Air than it does for Delta, given that they have a very serious union problem on their hands.
BOYD: Sure, I mean, Delta was a computer glitch at a very well- run company, Comair. What have you here at U.S. Airways is major management and labor problem and management better fix it or they're not going to have an airline to work at.
SANCHEZ: Michael Boyd, we thank you for bringing us up to date on this and sharing some of your insight with us.
BOYD: Thank you, sir.
SANCHEZ: Heidi.
COLLINS: We want to go ahead and bring you some new video that we are just getting in this morning now. Keeping our eye on these tsunamis and what has happened in the Indian Ocean. Several different countries affected. But this video coming to us from Sri Lanka, shot by a tourist, as you see people running away from these waves that have completely overtaken the poolside there.
Again, shot from the hotel balcony of this particular hotel in Sri Lanka. Thousands of people confirmed dead there in one of the hardest hit areas. As we continue this morning, we will watch these videos and bring them to you as soon as they become available to us. We'll be back in just a moment here on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: A very merry Christmas on the international space station. A Russian supply ship docked with the station on Christmas Day, delivering the astronauts a holiday dinner and a space probe was launched to shed light on earth's origins. Beautiful pictures.
Here to tell you more about a very busy weekend in space is Jack Horkheimer, the executive director of the Miami Planetarium. Looking like Santa Claus. How are you, Jack? Nice to see you.
JACK HORKHEIMER, MIAMI PLANETARIUM: Happy almost New Year to you. And I'm wearing this because I was supposed to be on Friday, but we had these wonderful launches and of course, so many things have happened since Christmas. The Christmas week really launched off a whole series of events. First, we had this wonderful launch to the moon, Titan, from the Cassini (ph) spacecraft. But before that, we had the launch of Progress from Russia, taking all this food up to the astronauts. And you'd be absolutely amazed at what the astronauts asked for.
COLLINS: Well? What was it?
HORKHEIMER: You want me to tell -- OK, well, you know, there's a Russian on board and there's a Chinese-American from Milwaukee, Wisconsin on board. Now, the Milwaukeeian wanted dim sum dumplings sent up and rice. And the Russian wanted, of course, of all things, he wanted borscht. But you know, of all the favorite foods that these astronauts are consuming way up out in space, it kind of sounds like they're right back here at home.
Their favorite, and the one that goes the fastest, I understand, is shrimp cocktail. They're absolutely crazy about lemonade, macaroni and cheese, barbecue beef, and would you believe, I never would have suspected this, vegetable quiche. You know, they used to say a few years ago that real men don't eat quiche. But I guess it's OK for spacemen to eat quiche.
COLLINS: Yes. Astronauts. All right, we'll remember that as we teach our children to eat their vegetables. But you know, this is a little bit more serious than that, when we talk about the food rations of astronauts -- cosmonauts, if you will, at the space station. You really have to keep an eye, obviously, on how much food they have. How did their rations become so depleted?
HORKHEIMER: Well, that's so interesting. I really can't get the full story because you get a different story everywhere you go on the web. But, basically the guys were conducting midnight raids on the refrigerator and nobody was keeping track of how much food was left because they store food in all kinds of nooks and crannies. It's not really food-organized up there.
And so lo and behold, they discovered a couple weeks ago, hey guys, you're running low on food and nobody even knew that so they had to get Progress up there because they only had about a two weeks of food left. They went on 400 calorie minus rationing. So they were consuming about 2,600 calories a day but with this big load of food -- it includes 180 gallons of water, they've got enough food now for 3 1/2 months. So they can go back to pigging out at midnight.
COLLINS: Yes, and plus all the stuff that they're stashing and hiding from each other in all those little compartments. Quickly, Jack, before we let you go, as you said, the probe is expected to land in about three weeks on Saturn's moon, Titan. What do they expect to see there?
HORKHEIMER: Well, the fascinating thing is Titan, of course, is the largest moon in the solar system, the only one with an atmosphere -- the only moon with an atmosphere. It's actually bigger than two planets, bigger than Mercury, it's bigger than Pluto. And we don't know what we'll find. We may find oceans of exotic materials. We don't know what's under that cloud cover yet. We've only gotten glimpses.
But when it lands, this Heigen (ph) spacecraft lands, on January 14th, we are going to open up a whole new world. I kind of like to think of Titan not so much as a moon, but as another world, because it is even bigger than the planet Mercury, which incidentally -- Mercury and Jupiter are visible, every morning now through New Year's, in the East, side by side, just before sunrise. So if you see two lights, that's Mercury and that is Jupiter side by side, all this week.
COLLINS: We will be looking for it, without Santa Claus at this point. Because he's already flown right past it. You have to be the Santa for us from here on out. Jack Horkheimer, thank you so much. Nice to see you.
HORKHEIMER: It's absolutely my pleasure. And Heidi, would you please tell Rick Sanchez, my old buddy, that it was 86 degrees here on Christmas Day?
COLLINS: 86 degrees, you got that?
SANCHEZ: Yes, I know, I was -- you know, Jack and I go way back. When I used to go visit his planetarium as a kid, he made me sit way in the back. Thanks, Jack.
COLLINS: Did you talk too much?
SANCHEZ: Nah, just -- not well-behaved. Well, new stories that we're going to be following for you on this day. The President has a lot on his plate going into 2005, but what should he tackle first? Kamber and May are going to battle it out. Also, the devastation in Southeast Asia is unimaginable.
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Aired December 27, 2004 - 08:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RICK SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: First it's an earthquake, then a tsunami. And what a tsunami. An unstoppable force of nature has exacted a terrible toll. This is massive water washed back into the Indian Ocean. The world is only beginning to realize, as it wakes up collectively, the number of dead, injured and missing and homeless, as well. Relief is streaming into coastal parts of Indonesia, Indian, Sri Lanka, Thailand. On this AMERICAN MORNING.
ANNOUNCER: From the CNN Broadcast Center in New York, this is AMERICAN MORNING with Bill Hemmer and Soledad O'Brien.
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Well, good morning, everybody. Bill Hemmer and Soledad are out this morning. I'm Heidi Collins.
SANCHEZ: And I'm Rick Sanchez. Good to be here.
COLLINS: Glad you're here.
SANCHEZ: Well, thank you very much.
COLLINS: New information still coming in this morning, talking about the tsunamis that have killed so many people. We are hearing more than 21,000, in fact. By all reports, there was no warning. We're going to find out about tsunami warning systems and the earthquake that caused the giant waves. It is now being marked as 9.0 magnitude.
SANCHEZ: And also here at home, we're going to be checking on the airlines still, trying to straighten out that nightmare that went on all weekend. We're going to be hearing about the perfect storm of problems that left thousands of people stranded and why they shouldn't be completely optimistic about getting where they want to go today. We're going to have all that for you.
COLLINS: And first up, we're going to check the headlines with Carol Costello. Carol, good morning.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to you, good morning to all of you. "Now in the News," a suicide car bomb explodes in Iraq, the blast killing at least six people and wounding 33 others. The explosion taking place near the headquarters for one of the main Shiite political parties in southern Baghdad.
CNN has learned American military commanders are boosting troop levels around the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, the scene of last week's deadly mess hall bombing. That as Iraqis prepare for elections set for the end of next month. U.S. central command chief, General John Abizaid, telling CNN as many as 8,000 troops will be sent to stop anticipated violence in advance of the voting.
Here in the United States, retailers are doing anything they can to lure you into stores this week. They're hoping bargain hunters will make up for disappointing pre-holiday sales. Some chains like Target and J.C. Penny are even running ads trying to get people to use their Christmas gift cards before the New Year's. That's because retailers can't claim count the gift cards as holiday sales until the cards are actually redeemed.
And daredevil French climber Alain Robert has conquered the world's new tallest skyscraper. The self-described spiderman scaling the 111 story in Tawain on Christmas Day. It took the 42-year-old four hours to reach the top, nearly 16,070 feet off the ground. The new skyscraper officially opens on New Year's Eve. And look, Robert has already christened it.
SANCHEZ: But why would you do something so brazen wearing hot pink?
COLLINS: Do you think he wants some attention?
SANCHEZ: Just the wrong color, don't you think?
COSTELLO: Did it look hot pink? I thought it looked more orangy red.
SANCHEZ: Oh, no, pretty...
COLLINS: Bright.
SANCHEZ: Yes, it was hot pink.
COLLINS: All right, Carol, thanks so much. We'll check in with you a little bit later on.
Meanwhile now, relief and rescue the top priorities this morning in six Asian countries following a major earthquake deep beneath the Indian Ocean. The epicenter was to the west of the Indonesian island of Sumatra. It sparked multiple tsunamis, which slammed into several countries throughout southern Asia. Giant waves engulfed coastal areas, flooding towns with floating buildings, cars and debris. More than 21,000 people are dead, thousands more still unaccounted for.
Hundreds of thousands of people are now homeless as entire villages were swept away. The earthquake measured 9.0, as we have said, in magnitude, the largest quake in more than 40 years. The hardest hit areas include Indonesia, India and Sri Lanka. Tourists at island resorts are among the tens of thousands reported dead or missing. Aneesh Raman is joining us now live via video phone from Phuket, Thailand, where close to 900 people have confirmed dead there.
Aneesh, good morning to you. Give us the latest, if you would. ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Heidi, good morning to you as well. That death toll more than doubling today. The reason, officials say, is that as of last night, some four to 600 people were thought to have been swept away by these waves, lost at sea, going into last night. Those bodies now starting to wash ashore.
Here on Phuket Island, the death toll now is about 130. The hardest hit is the coastal town of Pungha (ph), there the death toll over 500. And Heidi, as begin to learn the nationalities of these victims, you mentioned it earlier, but it is likely that a good number, if not a majority of these, will be foreign tourists -- Heidi.
COLLINS: Where are they now, quickly, Aneesh? Are there shelters that have been set up at least at this point?
RAMAN: They have the Thai government really taking a full approach to the rescue and relief effort, especially for the tourists. They have set up massive relief operations both here and in Bangkok. Tourists that have severe injuries are being medivaced to the capital city, where some six hospitals are on standby just for them. They are also offering free lodging there for tourists. Also, some of the foreign countries are beginning to send flights in to pick up the bodies of dead nationals, as well as to transport their citizens home -- Heidi.
COLLINS: All right. Aneesh Raman, joining us live, as we said, via video phone from Phuket, Thailand, where it is 8:00 p.m. there, 12 hours ahead, as people try to figure out what they will do next.
SANCHEZ: Let's talk to a survivor now. We've been talking to different people throughout the hours who've actually gone through this experience. Todd Everts is his name. He and his wife survived the tsunami that hit that part of Thailand. Well, this is what's interesting about Todd. He lived two blocks from ground zero, he survived the SARS situation in Hong Kong and now, he goes through this experience, as well. He's joining us now by phone.
Todd, thanks so much for being with us. I suppose you're feeling quite grateful on this day?
TODD EVERTS, TSUNAMI SURVIVOR: I am. I'm very grateful, Rick. When this event occurred yesterday, we were about 15 minutes from heading to the beach, where we had spent most of the day previously on Christmas Eve and then on Christmas Day. We're just devastated because there was absolutely no warning. We had felt something of a tremor earlier in the day, but had no idea of an earthquake, had no idea that a tsunami was coming. And when it hit, there was absolutely complete devastation.
After the swell went back out and it took with it cars and buses and unfortunately, many tourists that were on the beach, there people running, asking if they had seen someone. And it reminded of the days after 9/11, when people were walking around in a daze, trying to see if anyone could locate one of their loved ones.
SANCHEZ: You were kind enough to send us some pictures that you took with your own camera. And one of the pictures you send us is of a Club Med site. And I find this particularly interesting because I think most people who watch this have probably heard -- have visited or have wanted to visit one of these incredible Club Med resorts. Look at this. Not much left. Describe it to us.
EVERTS: Well, I'm not exactly sure which picture you're looking at. But Club Med is quite a large resort and a major structure that has several stories is still intact. But the areas around the Club Med, because it's I all-inclusive resort, are quite guarded with six too eight feet walls. Those walls were absolutely eliminated, which I think is what you're looking at.
That Club Med acted as a break wall, if you will, for the hotel that I'm at, which is one block away from the sea. If Club Med had not been there, then we would have been a direct hit and probably would have looked similar to the photo that you're looking at.
SANCHEZ: You know, when you go through things like this, your experience here, our experience -- covering the story of 9/11, also, the hurricanes in Florida, being a fellow from that area of myself, I always think that it's not just the day it happens or even day after it happens, but it has this lingering effect. And I imagine people there are still some what shell-shocked by what's going on. Put us, if you could, in their situation, what you're hearing from them today, if anything at all.
EVERTS: Rick, if you can imagine the coffee shop that you frequent on a regular basis or the place you have lunch or dinner -- we were just speechless in visiting the restaurants that we had frequented. On Christmas Day, we'd had an Italian lunch on the seaside. We visited that restaurant and there is there no restaurant. It's just simply a pile of rubble. The roof collapsed. The wood oven stove that was used to cook the pizzas is gone and the shop owners have no insurance, they have no inventory, they have no real asset to look at.
And tourists are leaving Phuket, they're not coming. It will take a tremendous amount of time to rebuild and unfortunately, these locals will have to rely on the government and any sort of charity and any sort of fund-raising that could be done on their behalf.
SANCHEZ: Speaking of that, what do they need? How can we help them?
EVERTS: I don't know, but I do imagine the Red Cross is quite involved in visiting with these restaurants and places. Anything that had one story is just gone. There is no more building. It's just simply everything that was in a restaurant is now on the beach, it's in the water, in the sand. To walk along the beach, you see refrigerators, you chairs, the normal things you would have seen in the shops.
And these people that own these shops literally have nothing. The larger hotels probably will have insurance and they can rebuild, but it's the small business owner that is most affected, and people and tourists looking for their loved ones which were swept out to sea.
SANCHEZ: Todd Everts, good enough to join us, going through a very difficult situation. We certainly appreciate your time on a story that we at CNN will continue to cover for you as it develops throughout the course of the day and weeks, no doubt -- Heidi.
COLLINS: Were any of the thousands of tsunami deaths preventable. Could people in India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Thailand been warned to stay away from the coast.
Well, David Applegate is a senior science adviser for the U.S. Geological Survey. He is joining us now from Washington this morning. David, thanks for being here. So what about it? If there had been an early-warning system in place, would people have been saved?
DAVID APPLEGATE, U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY: Absolutely. In the Pacific Ocean Basin, our NOAA, as well as agencies in many other countries, has worked to set up such a system to provide even minutes to hours of warnings. So simply people can get away from the coast. USGS provides realtime earthquake information, and then there's a system in place where you can take that information and gets folks out of harm's way. No such system exist in the Indian Ocean.
COLLINS: As we look at these horrific pictures of people just plain being swept away from things they're trying hang on to there, why doesn't the Indian subcontinent have such a warning system? Is it simply because they have never had an incident like this before?
APPLEGATE: Well, that's certainly a part of it. It's been probably since the 1930s the last time there was an earthquake that caused a tsunami that moved across the Indian Ocean, and it's been since the 19th century that they had one that even came close to this size. This is an absolutely giant earthquake. And as you can see the devastation that it produced is substantial.
COLLINS: As you say that, it makes me think a little bit about, you know, rolling the dice. It seems like if there's all this water surrounding several different areas, and smaller islands, as we see in this portion of the world, there could be a chance of tsunami. In fact, relate that to the United States. Just because we haven't had one before, is it possible it could happen here, too?
APPLEGATE: Well, absolutely. And the United States has been struck by tsunamis. In 1700, an earthquake of roughly this size ripped the entire length of the offshore known as the Cascadia Subduction Zone (ph) off of Washington State and Oregon. The reason we know about that because of very precise tsunami records that have been kept in Japan, the way it's moved all the way across the Pacific.
In 1960, the great Chilean earthquake, which was the largest earthquake in the last 100 years, this being the fourth largest. That struck Hawaii, the tsunami struck Hawaii about 12 hours later, causing significant deaths in Helo (ph). As well as earthquakes -- offshore earthquakes can occur off of Alaska, most recently the 1964 earthquake. Again, those waves only take a few hours to reach Hawaii.
The waves are very difficult to detect in the open ocean. You wouldn't even feel them if you were on a boat. But NOAA has set up a series of buoys out in the open ocean that can detect these waves and therefore provide some warning.
So could they do that for parts of the Indian Ocean now, and will that be done, do you think? Well, it usually takes an event such as this, hopefully not one of quite this magnitude, before the collective will can be galvanized to establish such systems. Both of the tsunami warnings centers that NOAA set up were the result of earlier devastating tsunamis in, first in Alaska and then in Hawaii. So I think it usually takes such an event. We know that we're vulnerable to many different hazards, and especially these events that don't happen very often, unfortunately it's very hard to focus on them ahead of time.
COLLINS: Well, David Applegate, I know that you have certainly seen a lot of this type of weather. So to hear you say that it was just unbelievable tells us an awful lot. We certainly appreciate your time this morning. Thanks again.
APPLEGATE: Certainly.
(WEATHER REPORT)
Just one week to go in 2004, and President Bush is spending it in Crawford, Texas. What's his biggest priority going into 2005? Well, Kamber and May will duke it out for you.
SANCHEZ: Also, Christmas is over, but the travel nightmare does remain. When will stranded travelers finally get to go home?
COLLINS: And do groceries finally arrived at the International Space Station? What was the most unique request? We'll tell you about it, on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: Welcome back, I'm Rick Sanchez here on AMERICAN MORNING. Bad weather wasn't the only reason that this Christmas weekend was a travel nightmare. A complete shut-down of Comair's flight management system left 1,000 flights canceled and 30,000 passengers grounded. Also, U.S. Airways still struggling to sort out a luggage fiasco. 10,000 bags were lost as baggage handlers called in sick in record numbers.
Michael Boyd, an aviation consultant, is joining us now from Denver to try and explain this to us. And we have really two different scenarios, two different airlines. Let's begin with Comair, what's the problem?
MICHAEL BOYD, AVIATION CONSULTANT: Just a mechanical problems. We had bad weather, we had a situation overloaded a computer. This is a computer glitch. Comair is one of the best-run companies in America. They'll fix that. These things happen. We've got to live with it as long we're flying on airplanes and using machinery to get them into the sky.
SANCHEZ: Is this going to have an effect on Delta?
BOYD: Yes, because, you know, you can't book a seat on Comair. Comair is not an airline. They lease crews and airplanes to Delta and Delta schedules them where they will. So these are Delta passengers, not Comair passengers. And yes, Delta Airlines will be working very hard over the next several days to fix the problem because it's their passengers.
SANCHEZ: You know, it's interesting, in this case, with Comair, I understand that there were employees who simply couldn't get to the airport because of some the problems on the roads, right?
BOYD: Oh, absolutely. And in Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, you know, they wanted to de-ice the airplanes. Unfortunately, they couldn't get any de-icing fluid to the airports, so airplanes sat there. It was a Christmas to remember.
SANCHEZ: Well, you know, that's certainly understandable. But now let's switch over to U.S. Air and that's a completely different scenarios. Here we have employees who didn't get to the airport, not because they couldn't, but because it appears they didn't want to, right?
BOYD: Yes, and that's a very tough problem. And there's a major management labor problem at U.S. Airways. I mean, the problem is, these employees have taken 40 percent pay cuts. The company needs, wants additional pay cuts. I can understand why they are demoralized. But the problem is when you start taking that out on that customer, you may as well put keep out sign on your airline and get in the unemployment line, because it doesn't work.
SANCHEZ: So you'd say things, given this scenario, bodes worse for U.S. Air than it does for Delta, given that they have a very serious union problem on their hands.
BOYD: Sure, I mean, Delta was a computer glitch at a very well- run company, Comair. What have you here at U.S. Airways is major management and labor problem and management better fix it or they're not going to have an airline to work at.
SANCHEZ: Michael Boyd, we thank you for bringing us up to date on this and sharing some of your insight with us.
BOYD: Thank you, sir.
SANCHEZ: Heidi.
COLLINS: We want to go ahead and bring you some new video that we are just getting in this morning now. Keeping our eye on these tsunamis and what has happened in the Indian Ocean. Several different countries affected. But this video coming to us from Sri Lanka, shot by a tourist, as you see people running away from these waves that have completely overtaken the poolside there.
Again, shot from the hotel balcony of this particular hotel in Sri Lanka. Thousands of people confirmed dead there in one of the hardest hit areas. As we continue this morning, we will watch these videos and bring them to you as soon as they become available to us. We'll be back in just a moment here on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: A very merry Christmas on the international space station. A Russian supply ship docked with the station on Christmas Day, delivering the astronauts a holiday dinner and a space probe was launched to shed light on earth's origins. Beautiful pictures.
Here to tell you more about a very busy weekend in space is Jack Horkheimer, the executive director of the Miami Planetarium. Looking like Santa Claus. How are you, Jack? Nice to see you.
JACK HORKHEIMER, MIAMI PLANETARIUM: Happy almost New Year to you. And I'm wearing this because I was supposed to be on Friday, but we had these wonderful launches and of course, so many things have happened since Christmas. The Christmas week really launched off a whole series of events. First, we had this wonderful launch to the moon, Titan, from the Cassini (ph) spacecraft. But before that, we had the launch of Progress from Russia, taking all this food up to the astronauts. And you'd be absolutely amazed at what the astronauts asked for.
COLLINS: Well? What was it?
HORKHEIMER: You want me to tell -- OK, well, you know, there's a Russian on board and there's a Chinese-American from Milwaukee, Wisconsin on board. Now, the Milwaukeeian wanted dim sum dumplings sent up and rice. And the Russian wanted, of course, of all things, he wanted borscht. But you know, of all the favorite foods that these astronauts are consuming way up out in space, it kind of sounds like they're right back here at home.
Their favorite, and the one that goes the fastest, I understand, is shrimp cocktail. They're absolutely crazy about lemonade, macaroni and cheese, barbecue beef, and would you believe, I never would have suspected this, vegetable quiche. You know, they used to say a few years ago that real men don't eat quiche. But I guess it's OK for spacemen to eat quiche.
COLLINS: Yes. Astronauts. All right, we'll remember that as we teach our children to eat their vegetables. But you know, this is a little bit more serious than that, when we talk about the food rations of astronauts -- cosmonauts, if you will, at the space station. You really have to keep an eye, obviously, on how much food they have. How did their rations become so depleted?
HORKHEIMER: Well, that's so interesting. I really can't get the full story because you get a different story everywhere you go on the web. But, basically the guys were conducting midnight raids on the refrigerator and nobody was keeping track of how much food was left because they store food in all kinds of nooks and crannies. It's not really food-organized up there.
And so lo and behold, they discovered a couple weeks ago, hey guys, you're running low on food and nobody even knew that so they had to get Progress up there because they only had about a two weeks of food left. They went on 400 calorie minus rationing. So they were consuming about 2,600 calories a day but with this big load of food -- it includes 180 gallons of water, they've got enough food now for 3 1/2 months. So they can go back to pigging out at midnight.
COLLINS: Yes, and plus all the stuff that they're stashing and hiding from each other in all those little compartments. Quickly, Jack, before we let you go, as you said, the probe is expected to land in about three weeks on Saturn's moon, Titan. What do they expect to see there?
HORKHEIMER: Well, the fascinating thing is Titan, of course, is the largest moon in the solar system, the only one with an atmosphere -- the only moon with an atmosphere. It's actually bigger than two planets, bigger than Mercury, it's bigger than Pluto. And we don't know what we'll find. We may find oceans of exotic materials. We don't know what's under that cloud cover yet. We've only gotten glimpses.
But when it lands, this Heigen (ph) spacecraft lands, on January 14th, we are going to open up a whole new world. I kind of like to think of Titan not so much as a moon, but as another world, because it is even bigger than the planet Mercury, which incidentally -- Mercury and Jupiter are visible, every morning now through New Year's, in the East, side by side, just before sunrise. So if you see two lights, that's Mercury and that is Jupiter side by side, all this week.
COLLINS: We will be looking for it, without Santa Claus at this point. Because he's already flown right past it. You have to be the Santa for us from here on out. Jack Horkheimer, thank you so much. Nice to see you.
HORKHEIMER: It's absolutely my pleasure. And Heidi, would you please tell Rick Sanchez, my old buddy, that it was 86 degrees here on Christmas Day?
COLLINS: 86 degrees, you got that?
SANCHEZ: Yes, I know, I was -- you know, Jack and I go way back. When I used to go visit his planetarium as a kid, he made me sit way in the back. Thanks, Jack.
COLLINS: Did you talk too much?
SANCHEZ: Nah, just -- not well-behaved. Well, new stories that we're going to be following for you on this day. The President has a lot on his plate going into 2005, but what should he tackle first? Kamber and May are going to battle it out. Also, the devastation in Southeast Asia is unimaginable.
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